Mud, Mud, and more Mud!!

Hello All!

Last weekend Darrell, my cousin Chelsea and I went to the very famous Boryeong Mud Festival. We decided to go for the day instead of the weekend because poor Darrell had to start intensives on Monday (he needed as much sleep as possible). We got up at 7am in order to get ready to take the 9:50am train to Daecheon (not to be confused with our Daejeon). This was my and Darrell’s first time on the slow train. It was no KTX…I mean I could actually see things go by in slow motion…haha, but it was a nice ride. As soon as we arrived in Daecheon we had to get our stuff and get off quickly because, like the KTX, the train does not wait for you. Quick as bunnies we were! However, we made it off and once we were in the train station we were being bombarded by our first Korean man saying “Hello…Where are you going?” to which Chelsea answered, “to the bathroom.” Haha…very nice!

After our trip to the bathroom we went hunting for a taxi driver. It was very easy and we pretty much didn’t have to tell him where we were going. We knew what he was thinking “oh, foreigners…to Mudfest.” After a 10 to 15 minute taxi drive we arrived at the beach and once again there was more bombarding by more Korean men asking us if we wanted a place to stay. They were all over disappointed when we kept saying “no”. It was time to fill our bellies with Korean food and then we were off to the beach.



The first we had to do was find a place to put the book bags. We were first going to find a hiding place in the bushes, but then we were thrilled to find lockers. In went all the bags, the clothes, shoes and jewelry…but the cameras were going to stay free. I must say I had no real desire to play in the mud, so I was in charge of the cameras. That way I could capture every express on their faces. We were ready and off to the mud – Well, Darrell and Chelsea went down to the ocean first to play in the waves, but THEN it was off to the mud!

Darrell and Chelsea went through so many different mud activities. First they went into the mud pool, where they would splash, role, and even hug loads of mud. It was a nice start! Then it was off to the mud jail where Darrell and Chelsea were imprisoned in a mighty jail where the ‘guards’ would throw mud at them. Poor Chelsea had her mouth open when this happened and she REALLY got a face-full :P While we were walking around, we saw so many different colors of mud. Chelsea wanted to take part in that color scheme, so she got herself painted blue. So many people were painted with so many colors – blue, green, purple and reddish-orange. So many ages were involved in getting the pretty colors. The youngest we saw was a very tiny baby boy who was being painted green. At first we was doing okay…until he looked at his body and saw green everywhere. He started to panic and cry, but his mother made them keep painting – kind lady! I am at least happy Chelsea did not panic and cry…although they would have made great pictures :P

It was an enjoyable day of mud! But soon the day was almost done for us and we were getting beat and sleepy. Which meant dear Darrell and Chelsea needed to get cleaned up. The only things I needed to clean off were my sneakers. They were filled with mud! I remember thinking to myself “maybe I should take them off” but I’m glad I didn’t. So many people were falling or slipping in the mud because it was EVERYWHERE! Even Darrell came close to falling a few times. A small boy even slid right into my legs…so yeah…it was everywhere. I am very pleased I left my sneakers on or I might have been falling with a very expensive camera and that would have been very VERY bad.

Darrell and Chelsea had one last round of mud paint and then they were off to the sea, the Yellow Sea for that matter. They were very salty when they came out, but at least most of the mud was gone…most of it. There was still some hiding like in the ears…yuck! So, the three of us salty and oily beings were off to homey Daejeon. We had a great time, plus we were also very pleased we only stayed for a day. It was a very windy day, so some of the attractions were not up due to the wind. Even the waves in the Sea were being watched by the lifeguards. Small children were being knocked over by the waves and even Chelsea had a little tumble. However it is a very nice day trip! We left at 9:50am to go there and we took the 6:55pm train back. Both train rides were about 2 hours long plus also needing to count a taxi ride back to our apartments. It was around 9:30pm when we made it home and a nice air conditioned apartment with a sweet hot shower was priceless.

There’s only one thing I can tell anyone who might be in Korea and interested to go: make sure you have a great bunch of people or a great set of friends to go with. There is nothing worse than going and not having fun because you went with the wrong people. The company you are with can make or break the trip. Suffice it to say we were in GREAT company!

The postal system strikes again!

Well, okay...not exactly the postal system. A more appropriate title would probably be "Lack of adequate communication has caused a rather troublesome issue with the postal system"...but that would be far too long of a title for a post that's not bound to become a paper for some university professor who likes painstakingly accurate titles.

Here's the story: as you all know, we were packed up and moved across town a few months back to a new school and a new home, with a new mailing address. Shannon was ever so kind as to send out the address we were given to many of you, and even sent out some letters with that address on the return. Since that time, we've only received ONE piece of mail that was supposed to have found its way to us.

We asked our boss if she could look into it for us (to no success), and in the process, found out that the address we had for the new school (which is where we have our mail sent, in theory) has been wrong the entire time. Combine that with the fact that our school changed names shortly after we arrived, and Koreans don't seem to do the mail-forwarding thing, and it actually ends up being a small miracle that even that one piece of mail made it through.

We've done little bit more looking, and it seems that any international mail that can't be delivered gets held for about a month (but is impossible to retrieve without a tracking number), and then gets sent back across the pond...by ground. So, to anyone out there who may have replied to a letter, or may have sent us a care package since April, you'll likely see that returned to you over the next 8-10 weeks. We apologize profusely for the confusion (and believe me, we're still quite confused over it), but fortunately, at least the mail is not completely lost (again, in theory).

If you happen to be thinking to yourself, "wow, that's crazy. If only I could sent those two a letter..." fear not! We finally have a proper mailing address!

Please feel free to send any and all cards, letters and delicious Canadian snacks to us at:

Shannon & Darrell Nevers
DYB Edusol 1109
4th Floor Shin Sun Tower
Gwanjeo-dong
Seo-gu, Daejeon
South Korea

This is Darrell, signing off!

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPod touch]

Leslie's Visit to Korea!!

From May 1^st to the 19^th we were blessed with a visit from our good friend Leslie. She had been planning this trip to visit us and re-connect in Korea for a while, since it had been 3 years since she was last here. She was due to arrive at Incheon airport Friday night, but the poor girl’s plane got quarantined in Japan because of the swine flu. She finally arrived in Seoul on Saturday around 4pm. We were soooo happy to see her!! She was welcomed also by a large group of police officers. This attention was not ‘directly’ related to Leslie, but the protestors at the train station. If there was going to be a riot, the police were going to be ready :S. Thankfully we got out of there before anything could happen. We were not completely sure of what the protest was about, but we believe it was either due to cut backs and less pay for the train station workers, or Mad Cow disease and imported beef (these theories were floating around).

We found a Love Motel in Insa-dong. It was not the greatest motel…our room had punch marks in the walls, no air conditioner that worked, and smelled a little bit of cigarettes. The three of us shared a room for one night but then found out the next day “only two people”, so we had to find Leslie another room… which wasn’t hard. We explored as much of Seoul as we could within the three we had. We bought a bunch of gifts at Insa-dong and went to the Hi Seoul festival (which just happened also to be supporting World Vision). They had a large spread of pictures that went back from the 1900’s to today, as well as many other people in costume representing those time periods.

We went back to Daejeon on Monday morning, so that we could show Leslie a bit of our home town. We didn’t do a lot…haha…more relaxed. Since poor Leslie was still a bit jet-lagged. We enjoyed the comfort of restaurants and going to the movies (which, by the way, if you get to sit in the front seats of a theater you get foot rests…which is AWESOME! We totally need that back in Canada!)

Unfortunately, Darrell and I could not get three weeks off work, so Leslie had to do a bit of traveling by herself. However, she did get the chance to visit with old friends she knew in Daejeon and her old school. Fortunately, we could do things doing the weekend, and the plan for the next weekend was hitting the Icheon pottery festival. This place was amazing!! It had wonderfully-crafted pottery that you could tell took time and heart into making. They had vases, tea sets, pots, cups, whistles, ornaments, and even some stuff that was less than G-rated. Haha…that is right….they had everything! We bought many MANY gifts and even a few things for ourselves.

We were really blessed on the 15^th of May. It was Teachers Day…so our boss gave us the DAY OFF!! We took Leslie to Noeun (our old dong) and showed her all the wonders it had - From the awesome stationary store, to Paparotie (which sells the best buns in the world), and out favorite GalmaegiSal restaurant. It was soo great to see it all again! Then for the evening (due to the rain), we went to see Angels and Demons…only to get trapped in the underground parking lot after the movie was over! Yeah…scariest thing EVER!! All us girls kept thinking “this is when the killer jumps out in the movies”. Haha…I think we have been watching too many movies :P

We had one weekend left before Leslie had to leave, and so we went on a trip to Busan. Darrell and I were really excited because we had not been to Busan yet – Leslie had when we was here 3 year ago. The downside was it was still raining from Friday night…and it was raining Cats and Dogs and maybe a few Horses all day on Saturday! We were going to take the KTX train to Busan and made it just in time for us to catch the train…well…at least that’s what we thought. A worker on the train asked us for our tickets, looked at them and said we were on the wrong train. He told us we would have to get off at the next stop and ran to the next plate form. This guy did not speak perfect English, but he spoke enough to stress that we were going to have to run to catch the RIGHT train at the next stop! And as soon as the train stopped, run we did…we ran our butts off! Made it to the other side and were told that the train would be 5 mins late. Haha…I guess we didn’t have to run :P but the important thing was we were getting on the right train.

We arrived at Busan with plans to visit two places on our weekend there – Taejongdae Park and Haeundae beach. We took the bus (which was first the wrong bus…haha, but then found the right one) to Taejongdae Park. It was beautiful there and we got amazing pictures. One would think “oh it is beautiful…so it stopped raining?” Nope! Never stopped all day! We saw the sights all in the rain…still, we would never trade it for anything.

We arrived at Taejongdae around 12:30 and spent maybe 4 hours there….haha….then the women were hungry again! So, we started making our way to Haeundae – the plan was to find a nice Love motel, get supper, and then maybe spend an hour at the Noraebang (Korean Karaoke rooms). We found a love motel that looked like a castle, plus it had huge rooms and cost very little…always a nice sign. After changed from our wet clothes (and I blow-dried my shoes), we went out to find food. We went to our first Bennigens….mmmmmm….it was sooo good! To this day I am not sure how Leslie ate all her ribs, but she did it. It was pretty sweet to have a club sandwich again and Darrell fell in love with the idea of deep frying your sandwich. We were very filled! It was Noraebang time! Again, we were just planning to stay an hour….that did not happen. We stayed for 4 hours and 30 mins – ended at 2:45am! We sang our lungs out!! It was sooo much fun and Darrell and I are now completely addicted!

It was now Sunday and we were told it was going to rain again, but praise Jesus it didn’t. It was a beautiful Sunday and we were staying at a motel right by the Haeundae beach! Right on! After making our way to Starbucks for some breakfast we moseyed on over to the Beach. All the foreigners were in bathing suits while most of the Koreans were in Long sleeve shirts (not all…but most). We totally didn’t want to leave…just bask in the sun, but we didn’t have much time left and we wanted to see the Haeundae Aquarium – the largest in Korea. This aquarium was amazing! It had everything – from fish, crabs, otters, penguins (my fave), octopus (another fave), rays, seals, and sooo many sharks. You could walk through a tunnel and it looked like you were being surrounded by sharks. We had a fantastic Sunday!

It was now Tuesday, the day Leslie was leaving. We were a little sad because it was nice to entertain someone, plus it was nice having someone from home. We shared a lot of experiences and a lot of inside stories. Somewhere Darrell and I are going to have to bring a Noraebang to Canada…haha! It is amazing we only have 5 more months to go in Korea and we are looking forward to having new experiences with old friends. Also, just seeing those friends again will we a great treat. It was wonderful having her here and we can’t wait to see her again when we come back home!